


Liesel's Secret

by rileyblxu (crownofplanets)



Category: The Book Thief (2013), The Book Thief - Markus Zusak
Genre: F/M, Memory, Reminiscing, Rudy's not alive sorry, kiss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-20
Updated: 2017-01-20
Packaged: 2018-09-18 20:00:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9400844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crownofplanets/pseuds/rileyblxu
Summary: Max Vandenburg had promised he’d punch Death in the face when it came for him. Liesel’s secret was the fist Max needed.





	

When Death came for me, it tried to fool me into thinking it knew more of my own life than me. I saw flashes of my young years pass before me like a movie. I saw the darkness of my first hiding place, my mother next to my aunt and cousins, pushing me in Walter’s direction, begging me to go. I saw the camp, the Hubbermans’ basement and I recalled my fistfights with Hitler. I saw the train that would take me to the best years of my life, and the one that would take me to my worst. I saw Liesel Meminger and her brown eyes with whether reports in her lips and snowballs in her hands.

It was as if Death was bragging about its knowledge, and what it knew about the most where the years I spent with the Hubbermans and Liesel. I could almost taste its smile as it took me into its arms, almost could hear its _finally_.

I wondered how it was that it knew anything about me other the circumstances of my death. In that instant, my soul —whatever that may be— felt Death hesitate at my thought, and realization then struck what was left of me.

_Liesel._  
_Oh, my dearest friend, you and your writing._

Then, as if a whole new level of revelation had opened its gates to me, I saw Himmel Street and Frau Diller and her _Heil Hitlering_. I saw sacks of stolen apples and two neat piles of stolen books. A moving picture of the mayor’s wife invaded my mind with her constant shivering. I heard the faintest chords of an accordion and felt as though my feet kicked a soccer ball, the harshness of it hurting my transparent-skinned, ethereal feet. Tommy Müller was there as well. And Hans and Rosa, of course.

But what shone the brightest in Death’s repertoire of memories was Rudy Steiner.

More specifically, Liesel’s lips on Rudy’s.  
My soul felt what Liesel had: the stone-like coldness, the desperate need of an answer, of the blink of an eye or the twitching of a finger; anything. Then, the inevitable and crushing realization that the boy was dead.

Death seemed to smile in pity, almost wishing it could have skipped Rudy, wishing it could have turned a blind eye to the inevitability of it. _Almost_ wishing.

“Poor thing,” I heard the echo of a voice in the back of my skull. Then I remembered I no longer had a skull, “If only they would have kissed when they both lived!” Death sighed —which was a strange thing to do for such a gloomy being.

If I’d still had a body with which I could have laughed, I would have done so. It was funny to me, the fact that Death thought Liesel and Rudy had only kissed once, when one of the parties involved was no longer breathing.

“ _Oh, no,_ ” I would have said, if my soul hadn’t yet left my body, “ _you seem to be mistaken._ ”

That was it. That was the fist in the face I had promised to give Death all those years ago. It was a pity the only thing left to witness it was something that would soon no longer be, and Death itself.

I realized then, that my death would not be a color to be added to its collection, but a secret. Liesel’s most precious secret.

She’d whispered it to me in the darkness of night, on one of her visits when everyone thought I was going to die.

I believe she wrote about Rudy’s continuous lack of victories, the string of failures involving Franz Deutscher and that bully with whom they stole food. What she kept to herself, however, was a kiss.

I wondered how Death hadn’t stumbled upon that secret when it took Rudy. They must have sworn never to tell, upon their graves.  
I also wondered how Liesel could have told me such a thing, given how good of a secret-keeper she was. Then I realized her excitement must have been unbearable, the secret as heavy as the world itself, stomping around her head. Her love, like an arrow shot by cupid, piercing her chest right where her heart was. Love was a weight too heavy for a child her age.

Do you have a Jew in your basement? _No, I don’t,_  she would have said.

Have you kissed Rudy Steiner?

_Yes, I have._

Oh, Liesel, how I missed her.

It didn’t matter how she told me, but _what_ she told me, right? That was what Death wanted to know. It didn’t care about me, it cared about them.

_This is it, dear Death_. Liesel’s secret, finally revealed:

 

Rudy Steiner had the hair color of lemons alright, but he also had a terrible haircut to go with it. That horror show had been the courtesy of one Franz Douchebag —according to Liesel, for I never saw the boy myself.

Liesel Meminger had dangerous brown eyes, to which I can testify myself. Her eyes were staring at Rudy’s head.

She sat on the damp grass while the boy let out his anger by throwing things into the Amper river. They sank with a satisfying _plop_ to the bottom, which was close to where Rudy was standing.  
The bottom.

“At least we know he’s not good at something.” Liesel suggested, referring to Franz’s abilities —or rather his disabilities— as a hair dresser.

“I’d rather he was good at it, _Saumensch_!” He said throwing a specially large rock into the murky waters, “Then I wouldn’t have this… this _thing_ in my head!”

Rudy kicked the ground and hurt his toe, but not a word left his mouth. He was too angry for that. Liesel, on the other hand, though almost as angry as Rudy —and thankful that it wasn’t her head Franz had decided to experiment on— let out a small laugh and shook her head in innocence.

“What are _you_ laughing at?” Rudy’s face turned the color of tomatoes, and he was one step away from being a living salad. He stomped toward Liesel and looked down at her with squinting eyes of rage and a frown deep between his pale eyebrows.

“Nothing,” she said, not afraid but simply not buying it.

She stood up and looked at him in the eye, wrinkling her nose at him. She walked close to the water and dunked her hand in it. It was cold and it felt like thousands of needles pierced her skin, but she bore it well.

“Here, let me fix it,” she said, as she ran her hand through Rudy’s hair, in an attempt to conceal Franz’s terrible punishment.

A thought came to Liesel that she’d never touched Rudy’s hair before. She was sure that with the proper amount of baths, his lemony hair would be soft and thin —like most Germans'. But because it had been a while since Rudy had even seen the washroom, his hair was oily and hard, like a stray dog’s.  
Liesel didn’t mind. Hers was the same.

“There,” she said after half a minute of battling with a single lock of Rudy’s lemon-stained hair, “that’s the best I can do.”

Somehow, her own words reminded her of her mama, and that scared Liesel a bit. It meant she was growing up.

Rudy was no longer angry, the girl could see it. Now that his rage toward the world had abandoned his tiny body, he looked tired. Hating everything that surrounded him had proven to be a most energy-consuming activity.

Without a fringe, Rudy Steiner let his body fall to the ground as he sat by the riverbank next to a comforting book thief. She realized they were playing roles which were not usually theirs: hers was the one of a girl with the ability to make someone feel better, and Rudy’s was that of a boy whose rage turned his sight red.  
I suppose they owed it to themselves, that change. They couldn’t always be the girl with the dirty mouth and the boy with the smart one (or the smiling one). Sooner or later, the times wouldn’t be fit for those children.

They sat beside each other in silence, as the sun moved through the sky from east to west. The shadows of things moved with it, avoiding it rather than following it.

When Liesel’s shadow touched the water, Rudy spoke.

“Don’t you just wish we could run away?” he asked with his chin resting on his hand, looking at the river as a broken branch floated away.

“Sometimes…” Liesel spoke, drunk in the warmness of the sun hitting her in the back and the sound of water running downstream. She took a deep breath and tasted the calmness of that moment, and wished silently that it would never end, “Not now, though.”

“ _Ja,_ ” he said, turning his gaze from the branch to his best friend.

Maybe it was Liesel’s calm smile, or maybe it was her hair, shining in the dying light of the sunset. Maybe it was the spark in her eyes when she turned to look at him as well. Liesel had no idea what had driven Rudy Steiner to sit closer to her, she told me so herself. The fact is that he did, and no matter why, once he’d inched closer to Liesel, there was no stopping what was coming next.

With eyes locked together like with chains, a book thief and a Jesse Owens wannabe sat close by the Amper river. With the sun behind them, warming their backs, and the sound of the wind going through the trees lulling them, both children tilted their heads toward each other and their lips met at the exact middle.

According to Liesel, it was like kissing sand paper, but not the rough side. The side in which papa used to write the alphabet. That side. She also felt the exact same as when her papa wrote that first _A_. Excited and a bit nervous.  
It was warm, but both their lips were dry because of the cold air that winter so kindly provided. It was a mere brush of lips, for neither of them had much experience in the field, but it managed to stir some strong feelings in Liesel. She told me of a ticklish sensation in the sole of her feet and a sudden warmth wrapping her body like a blanket on Christmas.

I am sorry I’m not able to provide much detail, but unfortunately I wasn’t there myself. Perhaps it is better that I wasn’t —I would have cheered.

It was Liesel’s first kiss, and Rudy’s last, although they didn’t know that yet.  
Neither did I.  
Neither did Death.

I am positive Liesel kept some things to herself, as did Rudy, otherwise I wouldn’t be telling this story, for Death would already know it.

The last interaction I had with Death went something like this:

“ _There you go_ ,” my body-less soul thought, “ _Please tell Liesel I’m sorry I told. I just had to punch you._ ”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for reading! I originally posted this on tumblr, and the reason behind the idea is that I just couldn't bear the fact that Liesel had only kissed Rudy when he was dead. I imagine many of you feel the same way. Hope you enjoyed reading as much as I enjoyed writing.
> 
> Anyways, kudos and comments are more than encouraged, even more so on this work, bc it's the first one I'm posting on ao3. Again, thanks for reading and have a wonderful day! :)


End file.
